A team of researchers developed a new system called Speranza to reassure software consumers that the product they are receiving has not been tampered with and is coming directly from a trusted source. Speranza expands on Sigstore, a system introduced last year to improve software supply chain security. According to the researchers, Speranza ensures that software comes from the correct source without needing developers to reveal personal information such as email addresses. This article continues to discuss the purpose and goals of the Speranza system.

New research reveals that a cyber espionage group called XDSpy recently targeted Russian military-industrial organizations. Researchers believe XDSpy is a state-controlled threat actor that has been active since 2011, mainly targeting countries in Eastern Europe and the Balkans. According to the Russian cybersecurity company F.A.C.C.T., in the latest XDSpy campaign, hackers attempted to gain access to the systems of a Russian metallurgical enterprise and a research institute involved in developing and producing guided missile weapons.

AppOms researchers discovered a vulnerability in Zoom Room while participating in the HackerOne live hacking event H1-4420. Zoom Room, a Zoom video conferencing platform feature, aims to enhance collaboration in physical meeting spaces, such as conference rooms or huddle rooms. The researchers warned that the vulnerability, discovered in June 2023, could allow an attacker to hijack a Zoom Room's service account and access the tenant of the victim's organization. Invisible access to confidential information in Team Chat, Whiteboards, and other Zoom applications is also possible.

The UK's National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) has warned about the active exploitation of Unitronics Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs) widely used in the water sector. Following a similar alert from the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the NCSC recommends that organizations follow its advice.

The US government, together with foreign partners, sanctioned alleged members of Kimsuky, the North Korean state-sponsored hacking group suspected of conducting numerous campaigns against entities in the US, South Korea, Russia, Japan, and many European countries. According to the US Department of the Treasury, Kimsuky is a cyber espionage and Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) group associated with the North Korean government, with the goal of stealing intellectual property, cryptocurrency, and other valuable assets to support the government's weapons programs.

The FBI and the US Department of Justice (DOJ) recently collaborated to take down the Qakbot malware and botnet in a multinational operation. Although the operation successfully disrupted this threat, Qakbot may still pose a threat in a reduced form. The malware had infected many devices, with 700,000 machines worldwide, including 200,000 computers in the US. This article continues to discuss the aftermath of the collaborative Qakbot disruption, mitigation strategies, and advice on determining past infections.

Apple has been forced to patch yet another pair of zero-day vulnerabilities, bringing the total for the year to 20.  The tech giant stated that the two bugs in its WebKit browser engine were being actively exploited in the wild.  The first vulnerability, CVE-2023-42916, is found in a range of Apple products: iPhone XS and later, iPad Pro 12.9-inch 2nd generation and later, iPad Pro 10.5-inch, iPad Pro 11-inch 1st generation and later, iPad Air 3rd generation and later, iPad 6th generation and later, and iPad mini 5th generation and later.

A collection of security vulnerabilities named LogoFAIL affects image-parsing components in the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) code from different vendors. According to researchers, attackers could use the vulnerabilities to hijack the execution flow of the booting process and deliver bootkits. Since the problems are in image-parsing libraries, which vendors use to display logos during the booting routine, they have a significant impact. They extend to x86 and ARM architectures.

According to Hornetsecurity, even though there has been an increase in the adoption of collaboration and instant messaging software, email remains a significant concern regarding cyberattacks. The threat of cybercriminals using malicious web links in emails is growing. An analysis of 45 billion emails revealed a 144 percent increase in this type of attack over the last year, rising from 12.5 percent of all threats in 2022 to 30.5 percent in 2023. However, phishing is still the most common email attack method.